DEEP R.IVER. particulars of what I'll say to Paul on our trip, since it's too easy to break one's :&ag- ile skein of worthwhile purpose by joust- ing with casual third-party skepticism. "My view is sort of a facilitator's view," I say, hopefully. "J just think he's got some problems figuring out a good con- ception ofhimself"-to put it mildly- "and I want to offer a better one so he doesn't get too attached to the one he's hanging on to now, which doesn't seem too successful. A defective attitude can ,.. get to be your friend if you don't look out. It's sort of a problem in risk management. He has to risk trying to improve by giv- ing up what's maybe comfortable but not working. It's not easy." I would smile again, but my mouth has gone dry as cardboard saying this much and trying to seem what I am-sincere. I drink down a gulp of iced tea, which is sweet the way a child would like it and has lemon and mint and cinnamon and God knows what else in it, and tastes terrible. Cla- rissa's finger-drawn happy face has droozled down and become a scowling jack-o'-lantern in the heat. "Do you think you're a good person to instruct him about risk management?" Ann suddenly looks toward the river, as if she'd heard an unfamiliar sound out in the summer atmosphere. "I'm not that bad at it," I say. "No." She is still looking of[ "Not at risk management. I guess not." I hear a noise myself: unfamiliar and nearby, and stand up to the porch rail and peer over the lawn, hoping I'll see Paul coming up the hill. But to the left, at the edge of the hardwoods, I can see, instead, all of Charley's studio. As advertised, it is a proper, old New England seaman's chapel raised ten cockamamie feet above the pond surface on cypress pilings. The church paint has been blasted off: leav- ing the lapped boards exposed. Windows are big, tall, clear lancets. The tin roof simmers in the sun of nearly noon. And then Charley himself makes an appearance on the little back deck (happily in miniature), fresh from this morning's brainstorms-cooking up su- per plans for some rich neurosurgeon's ski palace in Big Sky, or a snorkeling hideaway in Cabo Cartouche-Berlioz still booming in his oversized ears. Bare- chested, tanned, and silver-topped, in his usual khaki shorts, he is transporting from inside what looks like a plate of something, which he places on a low :> 'f r'y- írj' c: . f R-) { \ . j;:;\ · -,r \ I "- - -'1; ( - . '.V : ,: '" 0(.,"060:.:'0" ........................- - r ( '. ... 1 ' ) 4 t {m i!t { "" & >>! ..:;;,. '" .. .... .. ->-. . r -: ._ 79 ( \ ) i -, ) _ 2 \,.,J ,; \ . '. 00 '<I' .' !\.. t ).. . ). <<' ': ^)( ;, \ r. " "Don't get me wrong. Legality has its place. " . table beside a single wooden chair. I wish I could crank his big telescope down and sUlVey the oarlock damage. That would interest me. (It's never easy to see why your ex-wife marries the man she mar- ries ifit isn't you again.) I would like, however, to talk about Paul now; about the possibility of his coming down to Haddam to live, so as to stop limiting my fathering to week- ends and holidays. I haven't entirely thought through all the changes to my own private dockets that his arrival will necessitate, the new noises and new smells in my air, new concerns about time, privacy, modesty; possibly a new appreciation for my own moment and freedoms, my role: a man retuned to the traditional, riding herd on a son full time-duties dads are made for and that I have missed but crave But I'm thwarted by what to say and frankly inhibited by Ann. (Perhaps this is another goal of divorce-to reinstitute the inhibitions you dispensed with when things were peachy.) It's tempting just to push off toward less controversial topics: real estate, possibly, or Dukakis's chances against Bush. But Ann suddenly says, apropos of nothing, but also, of course, of every- thing, "It's not really easy being an ex- spouse, is it? There isn't much use for us . in the grand plan We don't help any- thing go forward. We just float around unattached, even if we're not unattached." She rubs her nose Wlth the back of her hand and snuffs. It's as if she's seen us, outside our real bodies, like ghosts above the river, and is wishing we'd go away. "There's always one thing we can do," I say. She makes a point of rarely using my name unless she's angry, so that most of the time I just seem to overhear her and offer a surprise reply. "And what's that?" She looks at me disapprovingly, her dark brows clouded, her leg twitching in a barely detectable, spasmlC way. "Get married to each other again," I say, 'Just to state the obvious." (Though not necessarily the inevitable.) "Last year I sold houses to three couples"-two, actu- ally-"each of whom was at one time marrIed and who got divorced and mar- ried, then divorced, then married their original true loves again. If you can say it you can do it, I guess." 'We can put that on your tombstone," Ann says, with patent distaste. "It's the story of your life. You don't know what you're going to say next, so you don't know what's a good idea. But if it wasn't a good idea to be married to you seven years ago, why would it be a better idea now? You're not any better." (This is un-